Wednesday, June 24, 2009

With our eyes to the skies and our pop sticks crossed, we're hearing it'll be hot & heavy this weekend. And that's how you want it when you're trying out our newest, baddest, black-est and blue-est pop: Blueberry & Black Tea. It's the sort of flavor that jumps the turnstyle trying to get Straight Outta Compton, but there's nothing straight about it. And that's a good thing, cause that's just the way our pals down at the Gay Pride Parade Pride Fest like it.

For our loyal downtown customers, the wait continues. For the 24th day in a row the people's pops is facing down clouds that make Independence Day look like July 4th. But not to fear...only good will come of this hiatus.

Our world class chefs have been working tirelessly in the flavor labs with some stunning produce from our local farmers including this season's first round of blueberries. So don't fret, pop lovers, we will be back and stronger than ever as soon as this weather passes. In the mean time get your people's pops information/location fix on our twitter account, and watch the Colbert v Rain dance-off.

Monday, June 22, 2009

We can all agree that this past Saturday was sort of a big, dirty bust. And we didn't feel all that bad about making our last-minute cancellation at the Brooklyn Flea. We simply told ourselves, "It's raining. Nobody eats pops in the rain, and nobody in their right mind tries to sell pops in the rain."

Up to this past Friday, it had rained for 15 of the past 19 days of June, and like every other New Yorker, we were over it. That's why when we woke up on Sunday at 6am, took a long, eye-glasses-less gander out the window and heard those fat drops smacking the pavement, we decided once again to throw in the towel. Accuweather's futuristic weather radar animation & the 90% chance of T-storms reassured us, so we went back to sleep, a tad peeved about our lame-duck Sunday.

A couple hours later, we woke up. Birds were chirping, the sun was beaming, and we were pissed. Like, ultra-pissed. The sort of pissed that gets you an all-expenses paid trip to the slammer.

That's when his name came over us like hot, humid, garlicky breath...Good Morning America's sun-kissed Lord of the Weather, Sam Champion...the revered boogie messiah of bbq's, beach-days, outdoor catered weddings and corporate events himself. A solar deity to most New Yorkers, Sam Champion is North America's Nostradamous: the premier, most precise, finely-tuned instrument of wizard-like weather prediction known today.

That is, until yesterday. He dropped a ball so huge, it crushed our spirits. Pops melted, children cried, and David needed a hug so large, it required several tremendous men to administer it.

Many thanks to Caroline Rogers of Looks Good To Me, who sketched the above image of herself enjoying one of our pops at Brooklyn Flea last weekend. Her blog is excellent and next time, she should introduce herself and get the free pop we've reserved for her.

ALSO. We will be selling honeyed pops at the First Annual Bee Ball on Monday night at Water Taxi Beach in the South Street Seaport! Just Food is the great organization behind this party, and we are excited to link up with them to support a cause we believe in: legalizing beekeeping in New York City. Bee there or bee square!

Thursday, June 18, 2009

How to buy a van off Craigslist. How to deal with the fact that the insurance costs more than what we paid for the van. What to doodle during hours on the phone spent finagling an alternative insurance plan, which, despite our best efforts, costs just as outrageously much. How to extract more credit from a bank so tightly wound that I've gotten bigger tips as a waitress than the credit they've extended.

Navigating the vagaries of various City departments: Revenue, Special Events, Health and Milk Control, Licensing and Permits, Ag & Markets, and Consumer Affairs, to name a few. Mapping out the best routes (whether in the van, on a bike or on the subway) between our commercial kitchen, the Greenmarket, Jetro Cash-n-Carry, our various apartments, and our dry ice supplier. Finding out--quickly--where to go when they're out of dry ice and we've got a freezer full of melting pops.

Tooling around the city breathless, passing the checkbook from hand to hand. Designing ingredient labels that the DOH will approve. Stamping pop sticks by hand, on both sides, 1000 to a session. Realizing that food-safe ink wasn't used. Realizing that they'll work just fine as business cards.

And then there's our technique. What are the most aerodynamic, wasteless ways to hull strawberries or wash rhubarb or measure out simple syrup? What's the ideal Brix level in a given pop mixture and how can we keep it there when our ingredients change week to week? How long do the pops take to freeze, and how do the different ingredients react to a blast chiller? What are the cleanest, most sensible ways to pour pops, unmold and wrap them? What--do you remember, guys?--is the legally correct proportion of sanitizer we're required to apply to clean molds?

Where can we source the best quality fruit for a good price and, for that matter, what fruits will survive this mid-June onslaught of water and cold?

What is the best proportion of gin to tonic after a long day's work? Might it be 100% gin, or does that just seem like the right solution when the bottle of tonic is empty and we're too tired to walk downstairs to the bodega?

Will it cost more to hire people to work the stand or work fewer stands and manage them ourselves? And how can we make the bloody sky stop raining?? How do we keep up with the endless ribbons of receipts for anti-bacterial wipes, pH test strips, food prep bucket lids, chalkboard paint, seven-ounce cups, gorgeous black mint, boxes of pop sticks, organic lemons, a couple hundred pounds of sugar, Department of Health permits, Deparment of Ag & Market permits, and dry ice, to name about a quarter of the things we spent money on this week?

How can we stay sane in the face of all these questions?

Now that is a good question.

Well, we've reduced our wastage. We found good prices on molds, packaging, a juice squeezer and a used freezer. Maxwell Farms, from whom we bought fruit this week, brought to the Greenmarket the best strawberries we've seen yet. We downloaded QuickBooks. All of our permits are finally in line. We designed labels we like. The pops, especially strawberry & cream, taste DYNAMITE. We figured out how to keep the pop sticks from slipping down while they freeze. This week, we had our second wholesale customer and two pieces of fan mail. We have a 29-day concession in Battery Park, four months in the making, that starts tomorrow.

Thursday, June 11, 2009

Our favorite band in the universe is the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Not only do we love the four-time grammy-award winning band's music, we also respect Anthony Kiedis' hot mane and sexy bod. Our favorite song, Under the Bridge was released on March 10th, 1992 – and was the driving force behind our 5th grade heroin addiction.

The summer sun hasn't quite set in yet for peaches, blueberries or watermelon, but that's a good thing for you rhubarb-freaks. We've made a fantastic few batches of the best that New York's Union Square Green Market has to offer:

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Ask us about our pop deliveries! We're up for anything...office parties, home deliveries, backyard BBQ's, corporate events, weddings and annulments. We can even provide a friendly shave-ice maker or pops server along with our signature silver cart!